My experiences with technology

Tag Archives: Microsoft Windows

DHCP is extremely common and is used by nearly every company out there. Windows Server 2008 R2 is also a very popular server for this kind of operation. These two facts identify this topic as ‘old news’ and is therefore more just for my benefit than anyone else. As usual though, I would be all the more excited if it did turn out to be beneficial for someone else.

Intro: As the heading tells, the goal here is to install DHCP service on a server and push out an IP, subnet mask, DNS address, and a gateway all through DHCP.

As a future resource for myself and a resource for others, I thought it might be nice to write a blog post on this. There are a few tricks and features that I have discovered in my quest to create this domain. I hope you are able to benefit from them in some way.

The idea here is to create Windows server 2012 as the first domain controller and then add Windows 2008 R2 later. To start, there are a few things that you should keep in mind:

DNS – When you install the domain forest for the first time, you have the option of creating that domain controller as a DNS server as well. This is the option I will be using as it is the most simple and integrates well.

Functional Level – You ALWAYS want your functional level to be set the the OLDEST server you have as a domain controller (DC). More on that later but for right now, just make sure you keep in mind which server is your oldest.

Computer Name – The computer name of domain controllers are, as far as I am aware, nearly impossible to change after it has been added to the domain. You should change this before walking through this if you so wish.

Options – There are many ways to go through this process. This walk-through will allow you to get a gist as to how this can be done. Weather you start with 2008 R2 or 20012.

Pro – I do not consider myself a pro at any level. In fact, I hope that if there are any improvements that can be made, I would expect and appreciate them to be placed in comments below. I believe it your duty (if you find errors) to report them in the comments as my intentions are to help as yours should be.